A Van Gogh inspired painting!

It was just so hard to get anything close to those curvy lines Van Gogh uses to draw wheat fields. I enjoyed this a lot. But I am lazy! Good stuff requires a lot more time and dedication and observation. Perhaps next time I’ll try and make something with a lot more vibrancy and realism!

Anyway, here it is, on 24” by 20”: 

Painting after long!

I tried my hand at painting after a long time! Tried to paint the following image: https://www.todaysphoto.org/potd/large/field-of-flowers.jpg. This time on a much larger canvas; I think this is 2 ft by 3 ft. Started by trying to be faithful to the image, with the sky, hills, and fence, but then I got lazy and let my hand run riot with the flowers. Pleased with the effort but it could've been better!

J'apprends à peindre, et à parler en français!

Kartiek

Ominous

Oil Painting - 16 in x 20 in.

Something's wrong with this world.

Kartiek Agarwal.

The Jazzman

Oil Painting - 20in x 20in.

I think I'm getting much faster at this painting business. This was done from start to finish in about 10 hours straight. I still need to learn how to make things sharper, and the characters need more detail but I'm not sure if the brushes at my disposal can allow me to do this. The one error that is easily mended is to first paint a background color and then draw/paint characters on them -- this is probably the first thing they teach in art school, but then I never went to one. That should probably make things look more polished.

Also, I wish I could play smooth jazz like Kenny Burrell or Scott Hamilton, sigh.

Kartiek Agarwal. 

An attempt at impressionism

Recently I've been visiting a lot of art museums. I was in New York with my parents for a little bit, and on a rainy afternoon we thought there could be nothing better than visiting an indoor museum - so MOMA it was. Then more recently, I was in Chicago, visiting Ivar at Argonne. Chicago is home to the Art Institution of ... Chicago, which has a very impressive collection of impressionist paintings, especially Renoir and Seurat. Unfortunately, the collection of Monet's paintings is a little slim and they definitely do not have the most provocative ones. Regardless, it was a very very good experience. I do not recall by name, but certain paintings evoked an unimaginably strong sense of appreciation in my heart for these people and their talents. Perhaps, such is the nature of impressionism -- it doesn't aim to capture reality precisely, but every painting is like a memory, fragmented, colored and... impressionistic.

Recently, I came across a stunning photograph (link), which was probably taken in Greece or Italy or Morocco, somewhere along the Mediterranean, and the nature of the painting is such that it naturally would've made a great subject for a surrealist painting. So much beauty, with a mixture of a little bit of the absurd? I knew I had to try and painting something out of this photograph.

Here's the initial result. I have to give everything a lot more detail, but I think I capture some of essence of the hot sunny sky and the beautiful blue sea in this initial coat of paint.

More updates to follow :)

Update : I ended up changing this painting A LOT, and not necessarily for the best. But here is the final result (the iPad isn't great at capturing the colors exactly, but that's OK), at which I stop working on this.

Which actually reminds me, why the sun's light stop at a point suddenly? Arghhh.... need to fix that!

Update : Now. I. Know.

Kartiek Agarwal

First attempt at painting.

Because, why not?

Largely an attempt to imitate this painting - http://dianehoeptner.blogspot.com/2011/09/second-thoughts-original-oil-painting.html

Day 1 : (~ 2 hours of effort, first coat of acrylic paints) 

Day 2 : (~ 5 hours of effort on the left and right flower, and debating on whether that fruit should be turned into an orange or not... still not sure.)

Need to really get the middle flower right and make sure that the orange slice doesn't look like a midgety banana anymore

Update : Day 3 : ~2 hours of effort on the middle flower, and added petals. The background was changed to something creamish to highlight the flowers more. It seems to look better now and even
though I'm not entirely happy with it, it will do. I need to give more depth to the apple, and of course, fix the banana/orange slice. The shadows need to be fixed, and vase needs more depth as well.

And finally,: Day 4 :~ with about an hour of effort, the orange was fixed (made much differently from that in the painting, perhaps a little more artificial), and the vase and table look better. I think that's that for me on this painting. I really exceeded my expectations, which is great, and I think I'll get this framed :)

Kartiek Agarwal.